What I am working on

At the moment I am working on foundation piecing. I am loving it. Amazing sharp points, easy to do little pieces and looking bright. I saw it on a blog, which then referenced you to the pattern.

This has been designed by Janice at Better Off Thread - Linked here to her tutorial etc for this block.
I was going to do an entire circle but then I have the begining of so many quilts that have no ending somehow. So I thought that a cushion or pillow will be better. I am also trying to do smaller blocks because spring is here and there is soooo much to do outside. Trying to fit that all in with working fulltime and presto, not a lot of sewing gets done. But in the meantime I am just getting a thrill from doing the blocks.

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We get there step by step

Slowly being built

For a long time we have been slowly sorting out the living areas in our house. We opened up from the kitchen to the laundry and that created light but also cold. So tomorrow double glazed doors and windows arrive to fix that problem.

The mess in the lounge

Now I am sanding and sealing

Today our odd job builder has been in putting shelved in an alcove in the laundry. These have been built from recycled Rimu, the same planks that were used to replace our kitchen floor. One shelf has been made using the tiny bit of Rimu that Aaron managed to rescue from his old family home before it was torn down after the earthquakes. So progress is slowly happening to ensure the front end  of the house is all livable while we complete an extension on the back end of the house.

In the meantime everything from there is strewn all over the living room. This is just the beginning. Once this is done then we are back in the kitchen taking out cupboards and putting in extraction fans.

Do we ever finish fixing up our houses?.... and you should see outside. We are still in a huge mess where we are bricking and tiling in the garden.

For the man who has everything - Give Florentines

Well my father in law had his birthday and I am stuck with what to give him. He is really helpful here around the place. Most recently he has been chopping all the firewood that Aaron collects and he has fixed my front door (which was sticking badly - but is no more!!).

The other day when they popped over he eyed up the YoYo's that I had made and snaffled a couple. So a ha, I thought. Homemade biscuits. So I made some yoyo's, Belgium slice, Afghans and then tried a new recipe - Florentines. (I use the Edmonds recipe for Yoyo's and Afghans but do not cook them as long as they recommend - only 12 minutes in the oven is all you need)

The recipe for Florentines I got while watching a recent programme of the Australian House and Garden. Love that programme. It is not cheap by any stretch of the imagination but they are super yummy.

FLORENTINES

180g bran flakes (I used cornies from Kellogs)

150g pistachio nut (not salted)

150g flaked almonds

80g chopped almonds (I had some and added some unsalted cashews to bring up the weight)

100g glace cherries (I did not have any so did not use them but upped the quantity of the other fruit)

60g glace ginger

50g cranberries

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 a nutmeg ground (grated)

1 395g tin of sweetened condensed milk.

Stir all together. Put onto baking paper and bake at 180oC for 10 minutes (seriously that is all you need) Cool and then melt some dark chocolate and spread it on the bottoms of the florentines. 

I had a bit of a problem putting the mixture onto the baking paper. So I used a round cookie cutter on the tray. Put in two spoons of the mixture. Pushed it down with my spoon. Then removed the cutter and that worked really well.

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Rugby Player of the year

Congratulations to Eli. Kaiapoi Rugby Football Club (KRFC) Under 9 Rugby Player of the year. Well deserved, so proud!!

Refashion a business man's shirt - sewing for me

From this

To this

I really liked the material that this shirt was made from. 100% organic cotton and it has a natural look and image to it. I should have taken a close up of it to really show. Anyway. There was enough material in it to make a little cap sleeve top for me. I actually used a pattern this time (very unlike me!). I have decided that the front looks OK but I do not like the back, it is all puffy and doesn't drape. So I am going to try putting the pattern on the bias and see how it goes as I think that will give it a lot more shape. As Gilli pointed out - it could do with being longer, but because it was a refashion I did not have enough material to do that.

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Number 21

Yes this is charity quilt number 21. Off to Hope Homes in the package. A real kids quilt. The centre Winnie the Pooh and the alphabet are a panel. The rest was some matching strips which I have added. But it all looks like it is one panel. I made this when I was on my quilting retreat recently. Started it, cut it, patched it together, sandwiched it, quilted it (some straight line quilting, some stipple and some outlining) and then bound it. All in about 4 hours. Yippeee!!! Was so intent on getting it finished that I forgot to take process photos.

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Best Date ever

Well that is what he told me when I let him watch 20 minutes of the all blacks game while we were on our date night! I took a photo to prove it.

We had dinner out, then went for a walk in a nearby scenic reserve (very reminiscent of when we were dating), then went and had a cup of tea and viewed the Bledisloe Cup match for 20 minutes while waiting for the movie start time. Watched 100 step journey and came home. Great night out and I scored brownie points!!

Wow a Christmas present completed already

 Way back here my Mother in Law decided to try making a quilt. It was gorgeous but when she finished I think that was it!! So I was the receiver of scraps. I have been pondering for ages about what to do. In the end I made two cushion covers to go on the spare bed with the quilt she made.

I do hope that she likes them! I am trying to branch out and do different quilting. So am quite pleased with the result on these. It is so much easier to practice FMQ on small pieces! Will have to do more.

The centre of each block

Two cushions ready for Christmas

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Amazing chocolate cake

At work the tradition is that on your birthday you bring in a cake. Everyone stands around the office, eats cake and has a bit of time out chatting about non work stuff.

I made this cake. I don't normally use this recipe as only Jakob and I really like it and I do not need to eat a whole cake myself!! Plus it uses two blocks of chocolate. This is a super dense, very nutty flavoured cake. The interesting thing is that the nutty flavour comes from putting fresh breadcrumbs in the mixture. Yes there are some almonds which enhance that. But when I first tried this cake I thought it must have been packed with almonds.

This is Kris recipe. I miss her. She is a great friend and when your great friend is on the other side of the world it is difficult to keep up to date. So thanks for making this cake and sharing the recipe Kris.

Kris's nutty chocolate cake.
250g butter
250g plain dark chocolate (over 60% cocoa solids)
250g Castor sugar (fine sugar NOT confectioners sugar)
250g ground almond
6 eggs
125g  fresh bread crumbs (which is about 4 slices of toast bread)

icing - 150g dark chocolate
           1 Tablespoon clear honey
           75g butter
180oC for 45min-1hr  in a 10 inch round cake tin

melt choc, cool. Cream butter and sugar and add eggs one at a time. It does curdle with that many eggs, but don't panic. Pour in chocolate and mix. Add almonds and breadcrumbs and fold in until coated.
Cook. If you want, when it is out of the oven you can prick holes in the top and pour over 2 tablespoons brandy.

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It's not just me!!

When I was away on my yearly quilting retreat I sat by Colleen. Now that it not unusual in itself but it was really funny that we were in the same seating this year and we were the only two people using recycled fabric. I wished I had a photo of what Colleen made. She had all her husbands old business shirts that had worn through at the collar and cuffs and had cut them into rectangles and made it into the most gorgeous summer beachy look quilt. 

Colleen and I upcycling a storm

I was also using business shirts big time. My nightie had ripped as the back was just so worn. But the bottom material was still really good (it also had been a refashion). So I still needed a nightie as I was short. Add one blue and white pinstripped business shirt and voila, a new nightie. All the binding ws made by me too. The blue binding at the bust and sleeve was another cotton shirt and the neck binding was a stripe business shirt.

So for those who know the band "Flight of the Concords", due to the material this nightie is made from I have named it "business time"!
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Number 20 which I think is the best yet

Yes this is Number 20 Charity quilt for the kids at Hope Homes International. 23 is the goal at the moment and I am shipping in a couple of weeks. A few weeks ago I posted about Hazel gifting me piles of material and books for the orphans. In amongst it all were a few unfinished quilts.

Pining it all together

Stipple quilting

As soon as I saw this I knew I had to finish it and get it away with the others. There were two very large corners completed and some rows. So after a bit of unpicking, straightening and then sewing together, voila this amazing quilt. It took me a total of one day from 9am to 9pm to sew, pin, baste, quilt and bind.

To get it pumped out quickly I just reverted to large stipple quilting as that is my fastest technique.

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